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The European Commission said von der Leyen’s plane lost its
satellite GPS signal over Bulgaria in a suspected Russian
operation, and has maintained its position as questions have
grown this week about what exactly transpired. The plane landed
safely at Plovdiv airport.
Zhelyazkov said: “During the approach of the aircraft ... the
GPS signal disappeared, which was reported by the pilots of the
aircraft to Bulgarian air traffic control. During the
conversation, a landing using the so-called ILS approach, i.e.
by instruments, was proposed.”
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said
Thursday that reports of GPS blocking by Russia were “100%
made-up fake.”
Zhelyazkov said he heard what happened with the flight after the
delegation disembarked and immediately ordered air traffic
control and the Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) to
investigate.
“On the same day, I was informed that the ground equipment had
not detected any jamming at that time. However, this does not
mean that no jamming was detected by the aircraft’s on-board
equipment,'' he said. ‘’I have instructed the CAA to contact the
company operating the flight to conduct an additional check of
the aircraft’s instruments and computers.''
Zhelyazkov earlier told parliament that because of Russia’s
radio-electronic warfare operations based in Crimea, there are
disturbances in the radio frequency spectrum in many places in
Europe. “But this is not related to the specific flight,” he
said.
For months, countries bordering Russia — including Finland,
Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia — have warned of increased
electronic activity interfering with flights, ships and drones.
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